You can’t say that Exit 6 1/2 has been cut out of the will, but neither is the Hyannis Access Study Task Force entrusting it with the family silver. The group, which includes state and local officials, was formed two years ago in response to renewed demands for an exit off Route 6 that would access Independence Park. Rather than focus solely on a new exit, the task force looked at the broad picture of getting into, through, and out of Cape Cod’s busiest village.

At Barnstable High School June 11, Adriel Edwards, project manager for the state, led a public information meeting on the group’s recommen­dations. They call for immediate attention to the Yarmouth Road/ Route 28 intersection, the Airport Rotary, transit improvements, and better utilization of parking at the Hyannis Transportation Center.

Those “immediate” actions (sought by 2011) are followed by “short-term” steps (due by 2012 to 2014) such as reconstruction of the Yarmouth Road intersection and expansion of the park-and-ride lot at Exit 6 on Route 6. Somewhere after that, under “other improvements,” would come further conceptual devel­opment of a option for Exit 6 1/2, possibly by the end of the next decade.

The task force’s studies showed that Exit 6 1/2 “is not the benefit the area needs at this time,” Edwards said, but does not go as far as saying there’s no benefit to a new exit.

“There were a lot of people who had concerns,” she said, “and there was a lot of support as well.”

Edwards was responding to the town’s former Department of Public Works head, Tom Mullen, who began his remarks with praise for the study. He said it had provided a regional look from “10,000 feet, then 5,000 feet,” as opposed to the usual ground-level local analysis.

Mullen said the study had not really identified any improve­ments that Exit 6 1/2 would provide. “It’s the elephant in the room,” he said before describing the recommended projects at other locations as “plenty of donkeys that can be worked on first.”

Mark Wirtanen of West Barnstable said he opposes Exit 6 1/2 because it will open Inde­pendence Park to big-box retail uses at the expense of down­town Hyannis. He objected also to expanding the Exit 6 parking lot to add dedicated spaces for long-term parking.

“To knock down a forest to put in another 250 parking (spaces) is the wrong thing to do,” said Wirtanen, who told a reporter after the meeting that his father had helped plant those trees. He noted the absence of park-and-ride lots at Route 6’s exits 2, 3 and 4, all in Sandwich, and suggested locating another lot there.

Speaking before Mullen and Wirtanen, Tom Bernardo, community relations direc­tor for state Rep. Demetrius Atsalis, noted that Atsalis is a long-time proponent of Exit 6 1/2. Given the development that is occurring in Indepen­dence Park, including plans for hundreds of residential units and a new outpatient campus for Cape Cod Hospital, he said continued investigation of a new exit is important.

Bernardo took issue with a report in another newspaper that he said made it seem “as if 6 1/2 had been jettisoned at 32,000 feet. That’s not the case.” Nevertheless, he said, “The 600- pound gorilla still has to provide evidence of benefits.”

Edwards assured Barnstable Municipal Airport Commission member Don Megathlin that the state sees the extension of Attucks Lane to the airport “as valid with or without Exit 6 1/2. It’s an important link in the area network.” The extension is part of an agreement among the air­port, the town, and the Cape Cod Commission for a new terminal